Rats, Plague and Water-Courses in Nantwich.

Connie Bullock

An article in the Daily Telegraph of October 22^nd, 1994, says that rat poisons with the taste of muesli or Dundee cake are to be used in an attempt to kill the increasing numbers of "super-rats". It seems that the rats have not become immune to Warfarin, the traditional poison. They have just turned against the taste. If these poisons prove to be efficacious it will be a very good thing. Rats, living in disused sewers, exist on rubbish found in skips and around local take-aways and anything which would reduce the number of these pests would be a good thing.

Rats may be a nuisance today and about four years ago concern was felt in Nantwich about rats in Welsh Row, but just imagine the horror which existed when the black rat, (now extinct), of a more virulent nature than its modern counterpart, was seen in the town.

The time was the fourteenth century and a plague brought by the black rats from the Middle East was known as the Black Death. It destroyed nearly half the population of England. Its effects were felt for nearly a hundred years. In Nantwich the fields became untenanted and uncultivated and the empty houses of those who had died became dilapidated and infested with rats.

In those days houses were small and poorly built of wattle and daub. The roof of thatch had a hole in it to allow the smoke to escape from a log fire situated in the centre of the room.

The room itself was smoky and not much light penetrated its dim interior. Rushes, seldom changed, were strewn on its earthen floor. These were a breeding ground for disease. The fact that people thought it unhealthy to wash or bathe did not help matters. Stacks of timber and general litter outside each house would bring more vermin. It was no wonder that plague and other diseases kept recurring for generations or that out of a family of ten or more children, only one or two survived.

Ratunrowe, the street in Nantwich known to be the worst infested with this earlier type of rat of the fourteenth century, had this name because it meant a 'row of houses infested by rats'. It was only later that it acquired the more attractive name of Pepper Street. Even then it was noted for rather dubious fame. This was at the time when graves and bones were discovered beneath some of the properties in the street, during excavations for a re-building programme and it was realised that at one time the ancient graveyard of Nantwich Church had been more extensive. I wonder if the former occupiers of Pepper Street ever realised what lay beneath their feet.

In early days Nantwich areas were named according to their nature. Ratunrowe was infested by rats, Dog Lane with dogs, Cow Fields indicated the pasturing of cattle and Welsh Row, in the fifteenth century, was known as Frogge Rowe because frogs from the nearby River Weaver infested the houses in the street. The old dilapidated houses, found there after the time of the Black Death, had been re-built and inhabited by the Welsh who brought their cattle to Nantwich and traded them for salt. It lay on the far side of the town bridge and was the main highway to Wales.

The following were the main water-courses of Nantwich. Down the centre of Welsh Row in former times was a channel of water known as Frogge Channel, which originated from a stream flowing from the vicinity of Dorfold Manor, and a little wooden plank bridge had been built in Welsh Row for the crossing of the channel.

One night in 1683, Widow Maddu, the worse for drink and unsteady of step, missed the little bridge and fell into the channel which at that time was quite deep due to heavy rain. She was drowned and then swept along with the floating rubbish into the nearby River Weaver from where she was taken and buried in the churchyard. The ancient Frogge Channel, which stretched from Welsh Row Head to Second Wood Street, was converted to a culvert in 1866.

At the far end of the town the old water-course alongside Churche's Mansion made its way along Millstone Lane and was the boundary of Nantwich Parish. Further down the street the Gullet (an ancient name of Norman-French origin) was a little water-course or ditch which went on to Dog Lane, finally emptying itself into the Weaver.

There was always the problem in early days of getting rid of sewage and the Lothburne drain, first mentioned in the fourteenth century was named the "Dirty Stream" and was the town's common drain which ran from the churchyard into the River Weaver. It carried away the sewage thrown into it by the townsfolk.

For drinking and other purposes the Town Well was used but when Edward Rogers was drowned in it in 1651 the townsfolk used open-draw wells in Beam Street, Pillory Street, Hospital Street and Welsh Row. Later on these had pumps fixed to them. If conditions were right, some people had their own wells and pumps. Maybe some of our members might know of such private wells or pumps. My grandfather, Thomas Church, had both a well, covered over with planks, and a pump when I was a child. He lived in Volunteer Fields before the other houses were built. A well, which had been covered over was found at Churche's Mansion in about 1933.

To revert to the subject of the Plague, the following was found written on the fly-leaf of a Sussex Parish Register:

"In the time of the plague let the person infected or fearful of the infection take a pennyworth of dragon water, a pennyworth of oil of olive and a pennyworth of treacle. Then take an onion and fill it full of pepper and lay soap and salt to your feet. Sweat upon it and with God's blessing you shall recover."

In Culpepper's "Complete Herbal" there is an entry for the plant Dragon (Dracontium): "The safest way is to distil the herb in an alembic...It scoureth and cleanseth the internal parts of the body mightily and it cleareth the external parts also....it is excellent good against pestilence and poison."